By Giuseppe Muro
They say a week can be a long time in football.
And for Neil Banfield and his Reserve side the past seven days will have had an unfamiliar feel about them after suffering their first loss of the season against Aston Villa last time out.
Young or old the taste of defeat is one no player enjoys and after winning became almost second-nature during the early part of the campaign the second-string will want to put last week’s result behind them when they face Everton today.
After picking apart last Tuesday’s 2-0 reverse Banfield is now looking for his team to respond – but what exactly has the manager done with his players during their week at London Colney to rectify the shortcomings of that performance?
“They were aware of what they did [wrong],” the manager told Arsenal.com. “Young players have these ups and downs and you just have to get back and work on your game and put it into your next performance.
“They’ve reacted well and it’s been very positive. It was their first defeat of the season and overall they’ve responded well on the training ground.
“You tend to pay a lot more attention to it when you do get defeated and look at the way that you concede goals. We’ve worked on one or two little things and reminded them what their responsibilities are in the positions they play.
“You have these ups and downs and you just have to get on with it and try and improve for the next game”
The young Gunners will be looking to get back on track after the first minor blip in what has otherwise been a hugely successful season and Banfield is confident the work done in between fixtures prepares his players as best they can be.
“We come in after the game and I’ll go through it and we’ll have a look at a few things. It is the team performance but we’re looking at the team performance in relation to their development in the game and the way we want to play.
“There will be one or two incidents that we’ve looked at and show the players concerned and then we put some work on so they can improve their game.
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